My W and I have been married for 8 years and we have 2 beautiful children ages 1 and 4. We have been physically separated for 7 months. After more and more years of my unhappiness in our marriage, I made the ultimate mistake....an affair. I felt so lonely in my marriage that I fell for someone else. My affair lasted for 16 months and, although I cared deeply for this OW, I just recently ended it. Yes....it was ME who ended it. Three weeks before I ended it, I confessed and disclosed the affair to my W in front of our counselor that we started to see together. I also told my family. I disclosed it to all of them because I could no longer live with all the lies and deception. But I could not yet end the affair due to the incredibly strong emotional ties and love I felt for the OW. Our counselor suggested I read the book "Surviving an Affair" and I did. I was very surprised how accurately is depicted what I had felt, why I was vulnerable, and what I was now feeling. [My greatest emotional needs were not met by my W and she was a pro at Love Busters. I am likely guilty of this too.] After the truth was known, my W was extremely upset and angry (understandably). She also read the book "Surviving an Affair" after I told her how accurate it depicted our situation. But she never stated or declared anything about her intent or desire for our marriage (only demands and condemnation at me to stop it) which made it difficult for me to end it. One week ago, I finally ended my affair (3 weeks after I disclosed it) which was extremely difficult for me. It was MY decision to end it because I did not want to keep sinning against God, I did not want to continue lying & hurting people, and I wanted to be "free" to make good decisions about my future with no distractions. Out of fairness to my W, I did not make her wait until the next counseling session to hear about it. I called her immediately to let her know. I have expressed my sorrow and remorse to her and asked her for forgiveness. We are still going to our counselor, but she still has not stated her desire for our marriage, even when asked by the counselor. Instead, she is acting very vengeful and obviously wants to hurt me. She screams at me, hits me, threatens me, lies to me, is secretive, and blames me for everything.....all out of her pain and hurt. My greatest hurt and fear is that much of her behavior (which withdrew love units) is exactly the same as just before I started the affair. Her lack of interest in our marriage has again stabbed me in my heart. My desire is for us to STOP hurting each other, admit our past failures, and to move forward together in a new direction. I'm not expecting forgiveness right now or for things to be good right away. But it seems the cycle of hurt and damage is just going to keep continuing. I've even tried to demonstrate my honest committment to this by calling her often, giving her my schedule, giving her numbers where to reach me, and not hiding anything (starting the Rule of Honesty). I love my W! I'm willing to do whatever it takes to rebuild, but I can't do it alone. I truly want to meet her needs, and I just really wish she would give the same committment so we don't continue this vicious cycle. I realize both of us are hurt and have unmet needs, but I'm the only one trying and "giving" & she is doing all the "taking". Please help!!! What should I do???

Lags, I'm no expert, just an objective opinion here, okay...<P>One week since you broke off the affair is not very long - your wife is probably still trying to figure out her feelings. Please give her more time, and meanwhile try to avoid ANY LBs, as hard as it must seem right now.<P>I know and you know that you want to make your marriage work. Just give it time and try to understand her hurt and confusion - empathize with her. It may take months before she feels she is really ready to forgive, and meanwhile you will be going through withdrawal from the OW, so it will be tough. Just stick with it - I'm sure you will get support here, they are a group of very caring people!<P>Best of wishes and hugs for you and your family...<P>((((LAGS))))

Hello Lags,<P>You admit that you recognize that your wife is acting out of anger and hurt. Don't think of her as vengeful, but as a human being in such horrible pain that she is really not capable of acting responsibly right now. I am speaking to you as a woman who has been in your wife's place.<P>You know that your emotional needs were not being met in your marriage. But do you also know that your wife's needs were not being met either? Have the two of you done the emotional needs questionaires yet? When my husband and I did ours, we discovered that two of his strongest needs (recreational companionship and admiration) were not being met, but ONLY two of mine were being met. And yet I was not the one who had an affair, he did.<P>Whether or not your needs were being met doesn't excuse an affair, but you know that. Let me give you some idea of what your wife is probably feeling. She feels like a failure as a woman and a wife. She feels rejectd, unattractive, abandoned and alone. She thinks that nobody can understand the terrible pain that she is feeling. She is hurt and angry, and probably somewhat in shock. She feels that everything she trusted and believed in has been snatched away from her. And at some point she will be VERY ANGRY because she was just as unhappy in this marriage as you, but she remained faithful. Her faith and trust has been stripped away, and she feels very lost and alone. She might have even considered suicide to escape the hurt she feels. She feels ashamed and humiliated of both you and herself. She feels degraded because you chose another woman over her.<P>I could go on, but I'm sure you have the idea. There is no pain on earth like the pain of betrayal. Now for some suggestions, things that helped me and I hope will help your wife.<P>Counseling is very important, and I am glad you are there now. I hope you are truly remorseful and express that remorse to your wife EVERYDAY. Tell her that you are truly sorry and want her forgiveness. Make spending time with her and doing things to make this situation easier for her your number one priority. Encourage your wife to join us here on this site, it truly helped save my sanity to find out that I was not alone.<P>To be honest with you, it will take a period of time for your wife to able to think and act rationally. Accept your responsiblity for that, and cope as best you can until this part of the grieving process is over. It will be terrible for a long while, but it will get better.<P>Best wishes,<P>Peppermint

You're not doing everything you can do. You're not giving her room to sort through this, vent, be confused, be angry, be hateful, and come to find her true feelings. It hasn't been a long time for her. You've been carrying on for 16 MONTHS and in just weeks you want things to be different? You gotta have a little more patience.<P>I don't know if time is going to change things, but I think you need to start there. <P>I was the same way when I found out. I wanted to throw my bum H out, I wanted to hit him, hurt him, be alone, cry, never see him again, hold him, and have him tell me the truth about everything while every detail stabbed me with pain. It's going to be a push pull situation for a while, but if your wife is like me, she is going to need to see you love her while she rages. If you withdraw, it will make her feel more alone and insecure.<P>I dont' know that once the dust settles, she will be willing to change. You say she's acting just like the pre-affair days. I don't really think she is in a state of mind to say, "Well, I contributed too and I should start trying to fix my end now." It's not going to happen if you don't support her though.

Lags,<P>Please be patient, you are on the right road, If my "H" had shown what you have, we would still be together. It will take time, she has her own decisions to make now, the hardest is to admit our own part in it. If she is still going to the counseling that is a good sign. Be gentle, loving and giving, keep up the honesty and keep praying. I will too.<P>Lila

Lags, You have taken a mighty big step towards repairing your marriage and getting closer to your wife. I commend you for your courage in taking these crucial first steps.<P>BUT . . The others are right. Your wife needs time and space to sort out her opwn feelings. No matter what you do right now, it will likely be received poorly by your wife. Your affair went on for a long time and neither you or your wife can just "turn it around" in just a few weeks. You need patience and perseverence to get through the coming times.<P>OK, A few bruises for you (but not meant to harm). Try to remember that YOU were the "taker" while you were in your affair. An affair is a very selfish thing. The lies and deception perpetrated by you have sliced through your wife's soul and attacked her very core. (OK, I'll put the bat away now). What you are doing is right but don't expect results so quickly. You may need even to back off a bit since she seems to not be receptive to all of your actions.<P>I would suggest you do the following:<P>1. Continue in couseling<BR>2. Formalize your Plan A (you sound like you've started one already)<BR>3. Keep assuring her that you love her and you will not leave her.<BR>4. Don't rush her along. She needs to heal on her schedule, not yours.<BR>5. Give her some time and space.<BR>6. Listen to the suggestions of the others in this forum.<P>You said you stopped the 16 month affair a week ago but have been separated for 7 months. So the affair began while you were still together and continued after your separation. Why did you to separate? Did you initiate this? Did you move into your own place or with the OW or did your wife move out?<P>Last thing, all is not lost. You can do this however, it will likely get a lot worse before it begins to get better. Stick to the plan, pray often, pray hard.

Lags:<P>The bottom line here is that you can only control your behavior. You can certainly influence your wife's---but you can't make her behave correctly.<P>Make no doubt about it---although she's "justified" in how she feels, she's squandering a very valuable opportunity to bring your marriage closer in a rapid fashion. And that's exactly what I would tell her, if she were here asking for advice.<P>But she's not. You are.<P>Your job right now should be focused on getting through withdrawal without having contact with the OW. If you're not able to turn to your wife right now (because of her lovebusting behavior), than lean on your counselor for this time (or another close male friend).<P>You are doing the right things---you're exhibiting the new behaviors that your wife is going to need to see for her to start trusting you again. I don't want to hear any of this whiny "I can't do it alone..." crap---you had an affair "alone", you can certainly take responsibility for starting to repair your marriage all by yourself.<P>You won't have to do this by yourself forever. But plan on at least a year of good, hard, consistant effort. And no slipups---every time you contact the OW, you can turn that calendar back to day 1. And if you do slip up---be sure and tell your wife immediately. And always with an apology---you should never be defending your behaviors.<P>Stick with the counseling. Listen to your wife. Work hard on your "Plan A"---eliminating the lovebusters, and starting to work on meeting the needs that she'll ALLOW you to meet. That should probably be focused on "family" issues.<P>

No offense but give some thought to what you wrote/said and what you are asking.<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Lags:<BR><B>My W and I have been married for 8 years <P><snip><P>My affair lasted for 16 months <P><snip><P>Three weeks before I ended it, I confessed <P><snip><P>But I could not yet end the affair due to the incredibly strong emotional ties and love I felt for the OW. <BR><snip><P> but I'm the only one trying and "giving" & she is doing all the "taking". Please help!!! What should I do???</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>OW: 16 months with her and it took you three weeks to let go even though you knew you were doing wrong.<P>Wife: 8 years (96 months) with her and you expect her to shrug it off after 1 week - and she doesn't have guilt to spur her along (not that she shouldn't take some responsability but think about where she is right now).<P>Come on man. I know that you want it to go away - I would too. But give it some time, if you love your wife as much as you say you do then you have to give her some time to deal with her own feelings before she starts dealing with rebuilding your marriage. I know my wife pushed me to hurry things along and all it did was solidify in my mind that she didn't care about me or my feelings.<P>Time and lotsa lovin'.<P>

Lags,<BR>When there is time between confession and ending of the affair, damage continues to be done...and your W suddenly KNEW FOR CERTAIN why you have treated her the way you have these past 16 months. Do you know that the infidelity literature says it takes the betrayed as long to get over it and equal amount of time that the affair lasted? That is how long you have to "give". Having an affair is all about "taking" you took from your wife that whole time, separated or not, if she still loved you.<P>She feels like a fool, cut her some love.<P>------------------<BR>Lor<BR>"Let love be genuine...hold fast to what is good; love one another." Rom 12:9-10

Hey there.. what everyone here is saying about being patient is right on the target. You are ready to move on.. probably desparetly so because you just broke off the affair and you are feeling alone and scared and wondering if you did the right thing. You are scared as to whether or not working on your marriage was the right choice. I don't know your whole story or your wife's point of view.. but, you said you have two children.. YOU DID THE RIGHT THING!!!! All those want, need and deserve is mommy and daddy being together. Now you need to figure out how to get there. Your wife is feeling betrayed right now and she has to work through that fog of pain before she can evan reach a point of knowing that she wants to try to work on your marriage. She is terrified, when she stops thinking how mad she is... that she will work on things with you and you will do this again. She is also doublting herself.. your affair lasted for 16 months and she didn't know.. so she is probably saying to herself, how can I trust myself to know when something is wrong.. I can't trust him to tell me. You know the biggest problem with affairs is the whole that they put in the trust for one another that has to exist in a marriage for it to survive. It is not so much that you slept with someone else.. it is all the lies that you had to tell to her over those 16 months so that you could go be with the other woman. Than you compounded it by the lies that you told in counseling. It is great that you were in counseling together.. but you didn't confess at the beginning of those sessions.. rather only recently. She is also probably feeling like an absolute idiot.. all those months of counseling.. she probably walked away from sessions feeling like she was trying to meet your emotional needs and feeling totally bewildered because it wasn't working.. well it wasn't working because you were not letting it work as you with the OW.. so how could it have worked? <P>Having said all this.. let me tell you that I think you are doing the right thing. You need to be strong now while she falls apart for a while.. encourage her to go to counseling without you to work through her emotions.. and you should get some separate counseling as well. You will also have to go through a hard time. Before you can get to the point of repairing your marriage you need to be prepared to answer her questions about what happened and why over those 16 months.. You might have to answer the same question a dozen or more times...You have hurt her deeply. You had a choice.. no one told you to commit adultery or forced you to do so. Now you need to be a man and face up to the damage that choice has led to.. you may or may not be able to patch up your marriage. Alot depends initially on you. She too will have to reach a point where she lets go.. and than you can focus on what your marriage will be in the future. You both have a unique opportunity here to rebuild your marriage, for it to be what you both want. But it will be the hardest thing that you both have ever done.. and there will be times when you will both wonder if it is worth it! I wish you both the best of luck. Your local book store should have many books about marriages recovering from affairs.. go and get a bunch of different ones..One thing that will help your wife recover is if she feels that you understand how deeply you have hurt her.. just saying you know and you are sorry is generally not enough for most women.. you need to be persistent and keep coming back even if she is pushing you away.. so that she can see you are sincere. This will be hard for you.Hopefully a good counselor will also be working with your wife to get her to release her anger in a healthy way.

You say a lot of good things about your efforts here....total honesty, ending the affair, going to counseling. Congratulations...you are on the right track.<P>The statement that troubles me, however, is the one about your wife not meeting your needs and "lovebusting" being the reason for your affair. If you are saying "I'm sorry I had an affair, but you weren't meeting my needs" or "I was wrong, but you were 'lovebusting'"....and similar statements, I'm not surprised that your wife is exhibiting a reluctance to commit to the marriage. There are no "ifs, ands, or buts" about it....<B>you</B> deserve all the blame for this affair, not your wife. Don't shift blame for your bad behavior onto her. Yes, you both have responsibility for the problems in your marriage, but you chose to go outside the marriage without her input...she bears no blame for that. <P>One of the things that helped me through the anger was my husband's total acceptance of the responsibility for his affair. He <B>never</B> blamed me or allowed me to blame myself. We both accepted blame for the condition of our marriage, but I bore none for the affair.<P>Give your wife time.....<B>lots</B> of time. Your bad behavior lasted for 16 months...why should hers be over in two weeks? You will reach her heart when you stand before her and take the anger rather than running from it or avoiding it. No, that isn't fun, but my husband did it and it made a huge impact on me....that took lots of courage. If she doesn't get rid of the anger now, it will come out in worse ways later.<P>Find the book Torn Asunder by Dave Carder and read it.....ask your wife to read it too. I believe it is the best book on restoration available. Draw on every ounce of patience you possess and then some....face the anger with love and continue the efforts at honesty and openness.....stay calm when she isn't...prove to her that you are sorry by your actions, not just your words.<P>------------------<BR>"They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint." Isaiah 40:31<P>

Lags...<P>Lots of good, good advice here. I've nothing new to offer, except to say that I'm sure you are in a lot of pain right now, and while your wife's feelings are justified, it probably doesn't make you feel very loved.<P>So, a word of encouragement. Follow the advice here, continue to do what you know is right, and you and your wife CAN rebuild a great marriage...it takes a lot of time and work, but can be done.<P>I'm sorry for your pain...<P>{{{{{{{{{{{{{{Lags}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}<P>Kathi<P>